Strata Will Challenge Your Mind While Pleasing Your Eyes [Review]

Strata, a puzzle game by developer Graveck, has been out for a few months now, but I only recently stumbled across it. Like FlowDoku, which I reviewed a couple of weeks ago, it’s a deceptively clever title that uses a couple quick rules to create complex tasks for players to solve.

The rules of Strata are simple: You receive a square grid between 2×2 and 6×6 boxes in size, and you have to place colored ribbons across every row and column. Some boxes have colored squares in them, and the top ribbon on that square must be the same color. That sounds way more complicated than it is, but it makes sense once you’re looking at it.

And you should look at it because it’s really, really pretty.

Stacking and weaving the ribbons creates some neat patterns — even if you do it wrong. Which I didn’t in this case, but trust me.

I don’t even know how to round out my word count on this one: It’s a good-looking, challenging game with a simple hook. It requires a kind of thinking that I’m not used to, but once I’d done a few puzzles, I could feel it all starting to make sense, and the levels got a little easier.

It’s a deceptively clever title that uses a couple of quick rules to create complex tasks for players to solve.

But then the game added a bigger grid or another color of ribbon, and I had to start the learning process over again. But then I caught on again, and so on. Strata made me feel like I was always learning and improving, and its difficulty curve stayed just enough ahead of my abilities that the levels were challenging without feeling impossible.

So short version: It’s pretty, and you should play it.

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Game Name: : StrataThe Good: It has a great art style and an interesting puzzle mechanic.The Bad: I got a headache playing it once, but that might be unrelated.The Verdict: Puzzle lovers who like pretty things would do well to download this game right now.Buy from:App Store

[rating=game4]

About the author:

Evan Killham is a freelance writer who lives in Nebraska and isn't interested in football, so he has plenty of time to play and think about video games. He has written for Bitmob and GamesBeat and sometimes, he even goes outside. But not too often because he's heard there are bees out there.